Page 77 of Secret Gifts
“He’s worried I’m going to do something to hurt you. I can hear his thoughts, and he doesn’t trust me even a little bit. He should have some faith in me, considering my sister is his counter,” he huffs out.
“He was a forgotten. They have a hard time trusting full bloods. It took him a really long time to be comfortable around Uncle Brazen.”
I look to Melania, and I wonder how a forgotten child felt being raised in a home that left her surrounded by full bloods.
Jase shifts uncomfortably, and then he walks over to the door to lock it shut once the brief visit from the other officials comes to an end.
“Now tell me what’s going on,” Jace says with too much seriousness, and everyone looks over to me.
“Aria, what’s this about?” my uncle prompts.
“He knows she’s a damn-”
My brother’s words cut off as his eyes shift to Melania, who apparently is the only one in the room that doesn’t know what I am… or does she?
My eyes trail over to Jase, and he shakes his head to answer my inner thoughts.
“You can trust her though,” he says while looking at me, and Melania tilts her head to the side.
“Aria, you barely know him, and it’s not just your fucking secret to share,” Rex scolds.
“She didn’t share it, Rex,” Aunt Angelica admonishes, finally jumping in to defuse my brother.
“Then he fucking read-”
“Dad told him,” I interject to keep him from sharing Jase’s secret with my aunt and uncle.
Rex stumbles backwards as his jaw unhinges. He falls onto the couch, and I take a seat in front of him to gauge his eyes and watch for dilation before tossing him a vial of olophine to inject himself with. He breaks the skin on his wrist, and he forces the medicine in while leaning back.
“That’s bullshit. Dad wouldn’t ever-”
“It’s true,” Uncle Grayson says while sitting down beside me. “Hale told me he had to make sure there was someone he trusted, someone strong, to carry on after he and Clay were gone. Someone who would do as they did to help keep the secrets Araya and Aria shared. I didn’t find out who until close to the end of Hale’s span. He told me to trust Jase with absolutely everything. I knew then that was the person he had told.”
"That would have been nice to know," my aunt interjects.
Unc shrugs apologetically, but he doesn't offer an explanation past that. This family is nothing but a wide web of secrets. Unbelievable.
“Why the hell would Dad tell anyone?” Rex blares, tears staining his eyes. “Our mother could be fucking killed for this. Aria could be killed. What the hell do you think will happen to this world if it comes to that? None of us would come down from savage until we killed every-fucking-body.”
I walk over to the couch, and my brother pulls me to him as his body trembles in fear. I’ve never seen him so worked up, and I know it’s because he’s already on the verge of a breakdown, worrying about the new emergents.
“New emergents?” Jase prompts, his eyes widening.
“I thought you knew when you came over to me and R-”
“I saw the pictures of you, your mom… that’s all he was thinking about. What do you mean by new emergents?”
“What the hell do either of you mean?” my uncle says as he stares at us in bemusement.
Melania’s eyes are wide, her jaw unhinged, and Rex’s head drops as he stares at the girl who just figured out what the hell was going on around her.
“You didn’t trust me?” she asks in a trembling, wounded tone. “After all I’ve told you, you didn’t trust me?”
I wonder what she told him.
Jase’s lips tighten, and his eyes narrow at his sister. She turns to meet his eyes, and apparently she explains whatever secrets she divulged to my brother without actually speaking aloud.
Jase breathes out a sigh of relief, and then he turns back to me, my eyes narrowing at him now.
